mentat

Yep, another question from yours truly:

I have been up all weekend trying to get some recording done and have gotten nowhere with it. I am about to wipe Linux from my hard drive and put WinXP back on, because all I had to do with Win was plug a mic into the input of my sound card and hit the record button. No stress.

I have configured the onboard sound card (nForce2 AC97 Audio Controller [MCP]) with ALSACONF, as I did with my other sound card (CMedia 8738 - I removed this card before configuring the nForce.)

I heard the test sample. I can hear sound through the speakers when I check the mic, and the various mixers (alsamixer, gamix, etc) control the level of the output.

S why the hell can I not record from the mic or get any of the software synths to play sound? What am I missing? If I can hear what I am saying into the mic throught the speakers and the signal is controlled by the mixers then why is it not recording or playing? ALSA MODULAR does not produce sound. Audacity does not record a signal. Don't even get me started on Ardour (it tells me I need a lib that doesn't seem to exist anywhere.)

I am not a novice to computer recording; I was using Windows and Mac machines for years before this and never had a problem. I have been able to resolve video and networking issues in Linux but this one is just driving me nuts. Tell me what secret little trick I need to know to get even one of these apps working, PLEASE!

Or it's back to WinXP and cracked software.

bpark

In my opinion, ALSA is still not fully developed. Try using OSS instead. By the way, can you list the distro and software you are using?

__________________
The best things in life are free.

mentat

SuSE 8.2
JACK
ALSA
Audacity
Pd
This is what I've tried running. But I can't tell what is working and what isn't. I would be happy with getting Pd to run well as it should do what I want. But I would also like Audacity to work for the purpose of recording small samples.

Ardour is another thing that I would love to get up and running, but as I mentioned there is a missing lib that I can't find anywhere -- neither on my machine nor through a Google search.

I really love Linux; everything else I want to do with a computer is far superior to any other system I've had, but I'm a musician so if I can't make it function then I have no use for it.

Thanks for your reply.

SuperDuper

Hi All
Have you tried the Agnula DeMuDi Live CD with a lot of the sound apps already configured, I have tried it and it does work, Rosegarden 4, various soft synths, ardour is on there cannot say whether it works or not as I only tried it on a pentium 300 with Soundblaster PCI 128 CT4810 soundcard, the machine only having 98mb memory(needs 128mb minimum).
Most sound apps in Linux need Jack, it is easier to use qjackctl which is a gui for Jack and what it does is allow to assign routing of audio and midi port connections this may help with your particular problem(recording and hearing your input).
In my experience onboard sound codecs/chips are rubbish they are just a cheap method of adding sound to a motherboard, I have only seen one motherboard with a decent chip which was produced by Creative which had a Emu 10k1 chip on board which is the same chip used on the Live soundcard, by the way the motherboard was Black.
So I suggest forget onboard sound and get a decent soundcard, check: http://www.alsa-project.org/alsa-doc...dor=All#matrix for supported soundcards.
Please do not blame Linux as a whole because most things can be made to work if you know how! , I do know documentation is not a strongpoint in Linux, but somebody somewhere on forums like this may have your problems solved.
Persevere and you may just achieve your aims, or do you just need a comfort blanket called WinXP, if so do as I do and get two removable hard drive caddies fit hard drives install WinXP on one, Linux on the other and only connect the one to the ide cable, mark one caddy Linux the other WinXP then choose which one to use.
Even WinXP users have various problems using sound apps which they have paid good money for with no help from the manufacturer.
Ardour being still beta software is also very difficult to get working properly even if you do know what you are doing which I do not, I have only ever managed to bring its interface up once, but after that would not open again, but their are other apps which can do a similar task, like multitrack 2.2.
Hope you keep persevering with Linux you will make it eventually.

jeremy1701

I know that with newer versions of Mandrake and Redhat, there's programs that install everything for you automatically. For example, I use Audacity to do a little bit of audio recording and it works great. Here's how I installed it.

That took about, oh, 15 seconds (I'm on cable). After that, I could run it just fine. Perhaps rather then post subject lines like:

Which is, BTW, a rather rude statement to make on a Linux forum, you should try an updated distro. SuSE is now SUSE and it's at release 9.1. 8.2 was years ago, dude. Time to upgrade.

Hope that helps,
Jeremy

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"All The Dude ever wanted was his rug back" - The Dude

mentat

Months later and I finally find time to reply. (I'm currently living n a tent on an organic farm -- yes, modern life got that annoying.)

I did not go back to WinXP, I went all the way to Win98. I had some projects that were aproaching dealine and there was no time to screw around. Let me just say that yes, it was rude to title my post the way I did on a Linux forum, but it was more rude to imply that I would turn to WinXP as a "safety blanket." I love the open source movement and Linux and I believe it to be of vital importance to the future. I despise monolithic organizations that seek to control information and the access and use of it. So there.

Now to the topic at hand:
I am getting conflicting reports from all sides as to the usability of some of these sound apps with no real identification of specific problems. Audacity works here, doesn't work there. This app works on my machine doesn't work on my buddy's. This release is newer and may (or may not) solve my problems. Not entirely helpful but it points the way. After all this isn't a classroom.

I am in the process of tracking down a half-decent laptop -- I live in a tent! -- and am going to insure that I get something with Linux-friendly hardware. At that point I will determine EXACTLY what I require from my software and select only the apps I need. Then I am going to beat into my skull the info and skills to make it work. Because I want to be an evangelist for open source and free sharing of information. I will spare you the manifesto for the moment, but it's a philosophy of life, not just tech.

Thank you all once again for your help. I am sending as many people as I can to linuxforums.org. You guys are great.

BCNU; mentat

u231

out of curiosity you live in a tent were and why and were do you get your power

mentat

At the moment I take my laptop down to the farm house and charge it there. I'm going to convince my hosts to get me a solar charger so that I can go completely green. Then it'll be free software and free power. HA HA HA HA!

u231

than my next question is do you grow hemp? i got a uncle up thier who has such large collection of fruits and vegtables

mentat

No, no hemp. This is an above-board family business trying to educate and build a network of community supported local businesses. Which is what we are trying to do here in the open source community. Share what we create (info & ideas) and support each other, purely in the interest of making this peice of life better for everyone. And to educate those that might not be aware of the "better" way. And also to break the grip of those entities that feel that things must be bought and sold, controlled and manipulated, owned and locked away.

Really, though. We're going to get kicked off the forum if we continue to stray so far.